A plan for defending US manufacturers from cyberattacks

In The Hill, Sridhar Kota discusses how the manufacturing sector is increasingly interwoven with information technology and the Internet of Things. | Medium Read

From Equifax to Target to Britain’s National Health System, major players in finance, retail, and government are reeling from cyberattacks. The threats aren’t just to consumer-facing companies or traditionally IT-driven organizations. Today, some of the biggest hacking risks are to physical producers. The recent “WannaCry” virus forced a Honda plant in Japan to halt production. This summer, about half of the organizations targeted by the sweeping Petya cyberattack were manufacturers.

As the manufacturing sector gets increasingly interwoven with information technology and the Internet of Things, industrial firms are increasingly at risk. Beyond the scale and intensity of the threat, there’s another issue: lack of awareness. Too few manufacturing firms in the United States acknowledge the need for action.